


Sex, drugs, and rock and roll

by Trash



Category: Linkin Park
Genre: Angst, Draven fic, F/M, M/M, old fic is old
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-28
Updated: 2014-01-28
Packaged: 2018-01-10 08:57:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,826
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1157700
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Trash/pseuds/Trash
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rock 'n' Roll drove my father crazy</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sex, drugs, and rock and roll

ock and roll drove my father crazy.

Not in the glamorous Hollywood way, with all its decadence and gentle melancholy. His mental demise wasn’t slow and certain; nobody knew he was on his way down. We just woke up one day and he was farther away from us than he had ever been.

There are so many factors that could have set him off: the divorce, the band, the fans…

Let me start at the beginning.

My parents divorced when I was a little kid. They always tried to be civil when they were around me, but I could never explain the strained atmosphere between them. They still think I don’t know that they hate each other, and I don’t bother to correct them. It’s easier to live in a web of lies and deceit it is to be brutally honest. Honesty hurts, and lies don’t.

Their divorce was followed by the slow downward spiral of The Band (capitalized, because they don’t even need an introduction).

Everyone blamed Mike and Fort Minor. But they never saw my dad drinking himself unconscious…night after night, regardless of the time or place. He drank, whether it was on tour or at home. My mom told me he used to be like this when she first met him.

With dry eyes, she muttered, “Once an ignorant dick, always an ignorant dick.” She said she hoped it wasn’t hereditary; she didn’t want him ruining my life anymore than he already had.

I was ten when he tried to burn the tattoo from his ring finger with a tacky plastic lighter he’d found down the side of the couch. He had his hand on the floral chopping board, the one Grandma Cardossa bought for he and my mom when they first moved in together. The lighter was poised over his finger, and I didn’t even let him know I was watching.

I simply picked up the phone and pressed one on the speed dial, knowing the number was Brad’s, and knowing he’d be right over.

I watched from the doorway as Brad pried the lighter from my father’s hands and draped an arm over his shoulders, drawing him into a quiet embrace. I don’t know what was said, but I know it was something significant. Everything they said to each other was important—it meant something. Every word was profound.

I left when dad turned in Brad’s arms, clinging to his friend as he cried and sobbing that he was sorry…so sorry for everything.

I liked to imagine that in trying to burn himself, my dad meant to say that he was sorry for the drinking. But when I spoke to my mom about it, I knew it was something completely different. She wouldn’t tell me what it was; rather, she cried silently and said “Not yet. Not yet, honey.”

When I was thirteen she burst into my room, mascara mingling with her tears and eye liner smeared across her skin. She called my dad names I’d never heard before; she screamed that he was a faggot, and that he’d betrayed her.

“I was on the cusp of adulthood and I didn’t know who I was,” she sobbed. “He…he helped me as much as I helped him. But then he threw it all away. Threw it all away for him..."

She didn’t have to explain it to me. It all made sense then. Suddenly I knew why Brad was on speed dial, and why dad cried every night once he’d left.

My mom made me stay away from my dad after that day. She told me that Linkin Park was slowly but surely breaking apart. She said that my dad was breaking apart; that she didn’t want me to have to see that. Half of me wanted to see it; half me wanted to understand what was going on.

But the other half of me tagged along behind my mother, and wanted to do as it was told. My constant ambivalence on the matter took my concentration away from school. There was frustration at home. My report cards were suddenly sprinkled with E’s and F’s, and little notes that said ‘try harder.’

School didn’t matter. Only my father mattered, and I couldn’t help him. I had never felt so useless in my life.

Finally, on my sixteenth birthday, I demanded that my mom take me to see my dad. She argued with me for hours, telling me that it was a bad idea, but I didn’t listen. I told her to leave me alone, and I walked to his house when she refused to drive me.

I knew he wouldn’t answer the door; he’d stopped doing anything that involved other people. As I turned the key in the lock and pushed the door open, my senses were bombarded by the strong stench of alcohol and the stale smoke of cheap cigarettes. The room was bathed in darkness, and a shirt I’d never seen before was draped over the lamp shade, drowning out the usual cozy light.

“Dad?” I called out, glancing around me and kicking empty beer bottles away from my feet as I moved further down the hall and toward the living room. “Dad, its Draven…Where are you?”

It didn’t take a genius to guess that he was unconscious, lying on the floor somewhere. Ever since Linkin Park had split up three years ago, I’d eavesdropped on whispered phone conversations between my mom and Brad’s wife. They discussed my father as if he wasn’t human; as if he meant nothing. They talked about Brad, and how he spent most of his time at my dad’s house making sure he wasn’t trying to kill himself.

It hurt. They threw the word ‘failure’ around like it was nothing. They said that my father was a failure; that he couldn’t even manage to keep himself together, let alone a band and his marriage.

Still, I looked up to my father all the same, regardless of their harsh words and bitter talk. Mike had told stories about my dad. He’d told me how things used to be; how my dad used to drink and take drugs and do everything he shouldn’t. He told me how he managed to pull himself together and straighten out the rest of the band as well. Mike had told me how proud he was of my dad for saving them all, and how proud he’d always be.

As I noticed my father’s sleeping figure slumped on the sofa, I remembered how Brad used to try to tell me stories; how his voice would catch and his eyes would fill up with tears, and he’d apologise profusely—the same way I’d heard my dad apologising in the kitchen, with the lighter all those years ago...

Another word, I had heard my mom use frequently with regard to my dad was ‘disappointment.’ But disappointment was such a harsh word to use. I, personally, blamed whoever called him a disappointment in the first place.

After all, if you don’t let yourself idolize someone, you’ll never be disappointed he or she falls from grace.

I knelt in front of him as he slept, his dark hair ruffled and his clothes creased. He was a mess in every sense of the word, but he was no failure; no disappointment. Not to me.

Rocking back to sit on my heels, I wrapped my arms around my knees and cocked my head to the side. Nobody had really confirmed my dad’s relationship with Brad. Nobody really needed to because everybody knew. Even Monica knew, but she stuck by Brad all the while, just as Brad had stuck by my father — because you can’t choose who you fall in love with.

I missed my father, that much was true. But I knew that there was a lot more to miss; things I had never known about. I wondered what he was like before the sex, drugs and rock and roll stuck a fork in the road of his life. I wondered what he’d been like on tour with the guys; if all the crazy stories I’d heard were true. I wondered, but nobody told me. My mom said it was for my own good.

“What you don’t know can’t hurt you,” she’d said. But she was wrong.

“Happy Birthday.” The man in front of me whispered a tired salutation. I looked up and my eyes met his, and I could see my reflection in his glistening orbs as a tear picked its way down his cheek. He shifted and sat up, running a hand through his hair and with a sigh, he gave me a weary smile; it was nothing more than a sad curling of his lips.

“Thanks, Dad,” I whispered, my eyes and my throat burning with unspoken tears. “Dad can I...I have a question.”

“Shoot.”

“Did you...did you and mom break up because of Brad?” I asked resolutely, and my voice shook a little bit.

He didn’t hesitate, and he didn’t bother to look up as he said, “Yeah. Yeah we did.”

“So why don’t you guys get together?” I asked. “Everyone knows, so you...”

He glanced up, his eyes still wet with unshed tears, and answered, “We can’t.” He shook his head sadly, causing another stray tear to trail across his pale skin. “We can’t. Brad would never ever leave Monica.”

I gaped in utter disbelief.

“But if...he loves you yeah? So he should…he should be willing to give her up for you.”

“You don’t get it, Dray. I’m a big fucking disappointment. No one would ever leave his loving wife for someone like me.” He sighed deeply, picking invisible lint from his shirt, and added, “Never...”

“You’re not a disappointment. Stop it,” I hissed, desperately trying to make him understand.

He gave me a stubborn smirk and rolled his eyes.

“I think you should find yourself another role model, Draven.” With that he clambered to his feet, kicking bottles and takeaway boxes out of his path with his bare feet. He pulled me up and smiled his broken smile, and said, “Tell your mom I said hey.”

He ushered me to the door, placing a gentle kiss on my forehead as I stood on the stoop and stared blankly up at him. As I turned away from the door, I whispered, “You always told me, ‘Don’t let other people ruin your life.’ You always said that. What happened, Dad? What made it okay for you to go against your own words?”

The last thing he said, before he slammed the door, was “Sex, drugs and rock and roll happened. Sex, drugs, rock and fucking roll ruined my life. I’m sorry, Dray. Happy Birthday.”

I stood on the stoop and stared up at the sky, finally realizing that rock and roll drove my father crazy; and there wasn’t a damned thing I could do about it.


End file.
